VW Polo - Everything You Should Know | Beyond the Badge

a household name in europe but little known in the us the vw polo is a staple car in the super mini class and is now on its sixth generation spanning the last 45 years but despite its small size it has a massive history with motorsport successes unique limited editions and a sizable cult following but it wasn't even envisioned by vw or anyone at the vw group how's it going people let's go beyond the badge and look at everything you should know about the vw polo the year is 1973 and the oil crisis has just ravaged fuel prices across the globe with the price of oil almost quadrupling at its lowest point consumers in europe and the us suddenly became a lot more conscious of how much money they were spending on petrol this led to the emergence of the super mini class in europe with cars that were cheaper smaller and more friendly on the wallet to keep running with cars at the renault 5 and the fiat 127 leading the charge you'd have thought a business as big as vw would have a car to compete in this class but this wasn't immediately the case in 1969 vw group took over the ancient german motorbike and car manufacturer nsu in part because they wanted to harness some of the nsu's knowledge on front-wheel drive cars and merged it with another brand they owned called auto union who had created audi the new company was named audi nsu auto union ag which is a bit of a mouthful but that's sort of how the german language works just keep adding more words onto the initial word until it makes sense now nsu had previously been in the process of designing a front-wheel drive small car to fit into the super mini class under the title project k50 which the newly formed audi nsu auto union ag brought forward with help from the italian designer gandini from the betoni design house also famous for his work on the lamborghini countach to develop the audi 50. it was released in 1974 and six weeks later vw re-badged the car and lowered the specs slightly as audi was obviously their more premium brand and re-released it as the original vw polo fun fact many of vw's cars are named after famous winds so the gulf refers to the gulf stream jetta refers to the german for jet stream and the polo is named after polar winds a strange convention but whatever better than what they were going to call it the mini golf after the car that vw had only very recently produced that would have been a weird choice anyway as the gulf was made entirely in-house at vw while the polo was made completely separately as discussed so while they relate to each other in terms of badge there's not much else that made the original generations related both the 50 and the polo had the same basic engine choices all inline fours with cc's ranging from 771 to 1272 so nothing to shout home about but given the oil crisis they landed at the perfect time they sold like crazy in their first year with over 150 000 of them going in total vw group knew they were onto a winner here so double down their efforts and over the coming years produced over 800 000 mark 1 polos and just 180 000 audi 50s which they cancelled in 1978 due to it not garnering the same popularity as the polo and audi wanted to focus on more executive cars anyway just before audi cancelled the 50 though they handed over their booted version of the car to vw to release as the vw derby which was literally just a mark one polo with a boot a saloon polo if you will which kind of defeats the point of being a super mini if you ask me but again whatever now this will all sound very alien to you if you're in the us and that's because the mark one polar was never exported by vw to the us not even under a different title like the gulf wars vw decided the vw rabbit as it was named in the us would be as small as north americans could handle as even in the 70s the u.s had an appetite for bigger cars so they thought the polo would be a bit of a sales flop and that's still the case today you won't find a polo or an up in the u.s because they're considered to be too small but in europe the polo thrived as a daily driver for both younger and older people and a few special editions were released too when the facelifted mark 1 polo was released in 1980 the car received a gt edition which stemmed from successes of the golf gti it had a 60 horsepower engine out of a derby saloon and sportier trim and interior unfortunately for us brits it was never sold in the uk only in mainland europe and only came in the same colours as the golf gti there was an even rarer performance mark juan polo too the rx which was only available in belgium and only 1 000 were made with even more sporty styling in my opinion and a go faster stripe along the side by 1981 vw believed that the polo had proven itself to be successful in its initial run and decided it was time for a refresh which came in the form of the mark ii this was to be produced for a much longer time than the original as its lifespan from 1981 through to 1994. with one major facelift in 1990 when it was first released it came exclusively in the bread van or hatchback style as it was referred to at the time with a completely vertical rear end it kinda looked like a miniature estate car and it wasn't particularly popular as people generally didn't like the shape in 1983 vw added a diagonal into the rear window and named it the qpa even though it really was also a hatchback to account for this and this time around people did seem to like it the car continued to be produced as a saloon as well just as the gulf had its saloon equivalent the jetta the mark ii actually came with some major technological advancements for the time particularly on the formal e model which was made to be as fuel efficient as vw could manage it even had an automatic start stop system that switched the engine off when the car was in neutral then back on again when put into gear the changes made to the polar in the 80s kept the car competitive in a market that was starting to get pretty fierce with the vauxhall nova or opal corsa being a fan favorite amongst families and boy races alike as well as other contenders like the ford fiesta citron ax renault 5 peugeot 205 nissan micra and fiat uno just to name a few contrary to the trend of subanes at the time some of these cars were given five or four door variants too which helped them to gain additional interest from a more mature customer base looking for a practical city car but a five-door never came for the mark ii polo what instead turned up was a bit of an experiment for vw i mentioned they previously released the rx and gt versions of the mark 1 polo but the mark ii brought about a fresh new platform for vw to play with which led to this the polo gtg 40. alongside the innovations like start stop vw wanted to test out supercharging so basically shoved one on a polo and released an initial limited batch of 500 left hand drive coupe models which mostly sold to vw workers and are incredibly rare today but the g40 every polo fanatic remembers came following the car's facelift for the 1991 model year this facelift brought about square headlights bigger bumpers and an updated interior while the exterior was also made slightly more round following the trend at the time this improved aerodynamics but personally i definitely prefer the older boxier shape but that's just opinion there were also changes to the suspension and chassis as well as the new brakes but engines generally remain the same although were given catalystic converters for emissions purposes the saloon polo classic ended production in 1992 after only being produced in spain during the final years of its life and the general feeling was that the polar was starting to become a bit dated compared to its rivals however it still continued to sell pretty well so vw basically relied on the continued popularity to draft and redraft their third generation car going back to the g40 though vw produced a bunch of supercharged examples for all polo markets it was quick for its time and class managing 060 in around 8.5 seconds and gained some extra features like lowered suspension special edition le mans sports seats and bbs alloys however sales weren't actually that great as it cost only slightly less than the far more sought after golf gti due to having very high production costs it was used as a homologation or promotion car for the vw g40 cup and some modified examples were actually sold to consumers in order for them to race in the series many of these cars were really unreliable though and they sort of tainted people's views of supercharging generally which may have contributed to the popularity of turbochargers as the alternative either way even though people seem to love the car now it wasn't a massive sales success at the time the second gen did mark a significant milestone for the polo though as the 3 millionth model rolled off the production lines in 1991 proving the car was very much cemented in the vw lineup and the final mark ii came from the spanish factory in august 1994 making way for the third generation to jump in that august of 1994 the mark iii was presented in paris as well as being launched in the uk at the british motor show it was a completely new car in pretty much every way except for the badge as i mentioned above the mark ii was considered to be an outdated example by the end of its run so the mark iii had to be ahead of its rivals to make up for it initially there were no sporty models just the lcl gl and glx trims available and the three different possible engine options were a one liter a 1.3 liter and a 1.6 liter these engines would follow on from previous polar engines however and were noted as being pretty poor as the 1.3 was replaced by a better 1.4 after a while and the 1.9 diesel model showed up in 1996. for the first time it had power steering and abs but one of the biggest changes was the introduction of a five-door variant to increase the potential market for the car it was also reported as being pretty similar to the new sayet ibiza in many ways sharing many of the same parts but the polo was definitely the more sedate of the two as it couldn't get the two-liter cupra sport engine into the bay which the ibiza did there were a bunch of other new features to fully update the car too like an adjustable steering column rev counter digital clock heated and electronically adjustable mirrors and a sony radio and cassette player meaning it was pretty well equipped for its class this led to a pretty sizable waiting list when the car was first launched throughout europe and the uk a plethora of other random updates happen with the third gen like new door and steering column locks an aluminium one liter engine with better performance and economy and the return of the polo saloon which kinda reminds me of an audi a4 from the back as well as a concept polo with an electric folding roof you'd get on a 2cv due to the sheer number of different types of polos the 6 millionth polo rolled off the production line cementing this car as the second most popular modern vw ever people assumed that the mark 4 would become the next focus for vw but from out of nowhere the polo gti appeared with almost identical dimensions to the original mark 1 golf making it a super fun car to take out on the roads however the real star of the mark iii polo show was the 1995 ultra limited multi-colored harlequin which was a reference to an old beetle advert where a car was constructed using parts from multiple generations of the original beetle meaning it had loads of different colours originally only one thousand harlequins were supposed to be made but reportedly 3 800 of them ended up being produced with their special joker patterned seats a facelifted mark iii dropped in time for the car's 25th anniversary and had some basic appearance changes with 32 different polo models available by this point it basically lifted its interior from the lupo which was a pretty significant update but probably the most interesting change happened to the gti it got way more power 125 brake horsepower as well as some more aggressive body styling and bbs split rim alloys as standard and while the press were gassed up about this car the facelifted polo that won an award was actually the new 1.4 tdi which was almost universally respected as being a surprising little package overall the series 3 pro was a resounding success for vw despite originally only really being planned as a card to buy vw a bit more time to make a better package in line with the ever-changing super mini category in october 2001 the mark iv polar was unveiled and went on sale throughout europe similar to the third generation it shares its platform with the equivalent ibiza as well as the mark one phabia but harked back to the second generation with its round headlights which originally people didn't really like too much but are now starting to become a little bit more endeared to in fact in general the car world didn't really find it at all interesting and it didn't really increase polo sales by very much and hit its peak in only its second year before heading back into decline though it was the largest most highly specced polo to have ever existed with aircon on all models except the base ones like mine all the driver aids you'd need and basically everything you could want it failed to excite in the same way as some of its rivals it didn't get an estate version either but it did still get a quite rare saloon variant i would argue that because of this lack of interest some of vw's great polo ideas never came to fruition and i've spoken at length about these in previous videos at the club sport r25 and gti they did however enter the junior world rally championship with the super 1600 polo mark iv having previously also entered with a mark iii i've done another video on this car and why it failed so feel free to check that out too vw knew they needed to do something about the mark iv polo to get people more excited about it and facelifted it faster than any previous polo putting out the newer looking model in 2005. the key differences were the new lights front and rear that better resembled the more up-to-date vws the slightly different hatch front bumper and a few interior changes but fundamentally they were the same basic car however to cement the fact that this new facelift was going to be an interesting car vw brought back the polo gti at the end of 2005 with its heralded 1.8 liter turbocharged engine putting out around 150 brake horsepower with a major aesthetic resemblance to the mark v golf gti despite it being a nice little car it was actually still less powerful than all its competitors from voxel and even seats which all put out around 180 brake horsepower so vw created the limited edition cup model which is much more highly sought after today this also sort of celebrates the vw polo cup racing series in germany one of the coolest polos in my opinion though was the dune which is a crossover suv style car which came with both the pre and post facelift it has a more off-roading style look and feel to it with its own bespoke alloys a roof rack and a generally more rugged design sadly it never got all-wheel drive but that would have probably cemented it as an insanely desirable little car as an owner on the one hand it's a bit sad that the mark iv doesn't have that interest in a history but on the other hand it has proven itself as a generally very reliable car depending on which engine obviously but this makes it a great ambassador for vw build quality and with the car's slogan being small but tough i can definitely attest to that this slogan was however used in one of vw's more controversial adverts i'll link it in the description and let you guys watch out your own leisure though the mark iv actually continued production in south africa all the way through to 2017 as the vivo the majority of european markets received the mark 5 polo in 2009 at the official end of the mark 4's run north america almost got it too as the us ceo for vw stefan jacoby announced it would join as the official entry-level car for the brand but sadly due to people wanting more and more bigger cars manufacturing space was prioritized for suvs and the likes and the polo still didn't get a chance to see the us roads the car massively modernized the polo and though it is larger than the 4th gen it's also almost 10 percent lighter it gained a far better initial reception too winning the 2010 european car of the year awards and increasing global annual sales from 450 000 to 635 000 between 2009 and 2010 and up to 809 000 in 2011. in my opinion these are one of the biggest polo jumps in terms of modern feel when you move from a mark iv to a mark v they are of course very similar in idea but the mark 5 does feel a lot closer to much more recent cars and by the way it shares its platform with the ibiza as well as the audi a1 like the mark iv the mark 5 got a crossover suv version the cross polo and the gti which felt a little bit half asked by vw with its 1.4 litre twin charger inline 4 engine automatic only gearbox option and minimal aesthetic differences compared to the standard car they did rectify this however as post facelift the gti got a turbocharged 1.8 with 190 brake horsepower a manual box and much more aggressive styling in fact it's one of my personal favorite looking modern gti cars in the correct spec and if you prefer to go for a pre-facelift car vw did create a homologation special polo rwrc with just 2 500 examples all in left-hand drive with a 2-litre turbocharged engine putting out around 220 brake horsepower with a 6-speed manual gearbox it is well worth noting that vw absolutely smashed it in wrc in 2013 becoming constructors and drivers championship title winners in their debut season with sebastian ogier at the wheel they went on to win again in 2014 2015 and 2016 which is just an exceptional feat especially if you know how tough rallying can be a real testament to both car and driver that facelift came in 2014 with some small aesthetic changes to the bumpers but some big changes to the interior with a touchscreen as standard and a bunch of extra tech features by this point we're a long way away from the humble polo beginnings as a small simple run around city car and instead catering to a society that want their car to do everything and anything for them and last but not least we get to the most recent vw polo the mark vi which was released in 2017 with one slightly controversial twist it no longer features a three-door example to cut costs vw decided the five-door was more popular and stuck with that which makes sense as the vast majority of polo customers want something as practical and useful as possible which three doors doesn't really represent a shame though as a three-door polo always looks good and is where the car started the whole switch to the mark vi has been about practicality more cabin space more boot space better technology more capable efficient engines more safety there is of course still the performance gti model which was hugely popular on launch and had quite an extensive wait list with its 2 litre turbocharged engine putting out 197 brake horsepower mated exclusively to a dsg automatic it stays true to other gti's in its tartan seats and red stitching but if i'm perfectly honest i think the mark v is a nicer looking package all around still now that the polo has reached this stage of maturity with over 14 million sold it will be interesting to see where it goes with the push towards zero emissions if you look at vw's lineup of electric and hybrid cars the polo doesn't get a mention and i fear that the id3 might be the car that picks up from the polo in the future in 2014 it was suggested there might be a compressed natural gas polo and a plug-in hybrid electric polo but these never seem to appear i'd assume vw wouldn't let go of such a household name or would they i hope you enjoyed this first beyond the badge video i'd love to get your feedback in the comments and i have some changes i'd like to make anyway in the future to make this more sharp and interesting for you guys watching remember to hit the like button if you enjoyed subscribe and turn on notifications if you're new a massive thank you to the patrons as always and to you lot for watching i'll see you in the next one you

Channel: Cars With JB

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Keywords: carswithjb, cars with jb, top 5, top 10, cars, car, cheap, polo, mk1, mk2, mk3, mk4, mk5, mk6, 9n, 9n3, 6n, 6n2, 6r, audi, 50, k50, nsu, luxury car, family car, supermini, small car, history, luxury, up to speed, beyond the badge

Id: xTgY6A2plXE

Length: 19min 56sec (1196 seconds)

Published: Fri Nov 27 2020